Share this story with a friend:

Share this story with a friend:

The shootout in Waco in May 2015 left nine bikers dead and 177 others behind bars.

On May 17 there was a shootout at the Waco strip mall restaurant, Twin Peaks. The world was led to believe that, as the Dallas Morning News puts it, nine deaths and 22 injuries were the result of hardened criminal thugs waging a deadly turf battle.

There were 177 bikers arrested with a bond set for their release at $1 million dollars each. So far, not a single person has been formally charged, and there’s a gag order on the case. No officials are talking. In fact, nothing about the incident – photos, videos, text messages, ballistics reports, has been released.

The public is getting the police narrative, and then there’s the bikers’ point of view. As the Dallas Morning News is reporting, bikers seem to be gaining more trust than prosecutors.

Finally, the wall of silence has started to crack.

Leaked videos have been aired by CNN, vivid images that had been closely held by the Waco police, and never-before-seen by the public. Police issued a statement saying they didn’t release the videos, but says: “The party responsible for providing the released video and photographs may be subject to ethical and legal issues for doing so.”

Susan E. Anderson, is a defense attorney based out of Dallas. She is representing one of the Waco 177. She says one way to describe the videos is “reactionary.”

“That’s one of the things that I find interesting about it,” she says. “They are reacting to something that is happening in the parking lot. That there is something out there that caught their attention — not only caught their attention, but made them panic.”

Anderson says the videos seem defensive, rather than offensive.

“Everyone seems to be running in different directions,” she says.

The million-dollar question is if the police didn’t release these videos, then where did they come from?

Anderson says it could have been a defense attorney – the videos were part of a “discovery package” they received over the case. Maybe they came from the DA’s office, or an investigator in the Waco Police Department. Twin Peaks, the restaurant where the shooting took place could also have released the videos.

One thing is for certain, Anderson says: “We have no idea who released them.”

The videos do advance the biker gang shootout narrative, however. Anderson says they reveal that there were a lot of people involved who were just in the wrong place at the wrong time.

“It shows that there are a lot of people that were there that really had nothing to do with the shooting,” she says. “It shows that there are a lot of innocent people that were rounded up and arrested…. As you can see in the video, you can see them being led out of the restaurant with their hands behind their heads. They were part of the roundup.”

In CNN’s broadcast, someone is seen firing a gun, Anderson says, but this video is a portion of the evidence, and it’s hard to glean anything from just a part.

“There are so many videos out there, that what really need to happen is all the videos need to be looked at in sequence and in totality,” she says. “Because right now, what you’re seeing is one snippet. We don’t know what’s going on outside the restaurant, we don’t know whether he was shooting at something or firing indiscriminately.”